Sharing Might Work

The Times story today about a beating in Shaker Heights is depressing. Shaker Heights is a community we've all admired over the years--upscale yet biracial--one of the few perhaps, at least that I've heard about. So now some Black teenagers from Cleveland gratuitously beat up a 52-year-old white lawyer out for a walk at night and the only thought is increased police presence. Cleveland, which Shaker Heights is basically a part of, has been getting poorer every year. It's one of the poorest cities in the country. Does it ever occur to anyone in Shaker Heights (or to any of us) to share some of their good fortune with their poorer neighbors outside the borders of the suburb? Like instead of paying more taxes for more police, how about spending that money on better schools in Cleveland, more services for poorer residents, whatever. Wouldn't that be a smart way of approaching things? But that idea apparently doesn't come up,even in such a progressive community, at least according to the Times, which doesn't so much as mention such a possibility.